A Revry original, Unconventional is a really well-liked queer dramedy that feels totally different from the usual stuff. The heart of the story is about two pretty eccentric queer siblings and their partners trying to build a family that doesn't follow the traditional rules. It takes a super raw and unfiltered look at queer life, diving deep into things like mental health, addiction, and how complicated identity and relationships can get. It’s not afraid to get messy or show people at their most vulnerable, and it really pushes boundaries while showing a lot of different queer experiences. The first season has nine episodes, and each one is about a half-hour long. The story centers on Noah, a grad student who’s been struggling for years to wrap up his PhD. He’s been with his husband, Dan, for nine years, and they’ve recently gotten married and moved to Palm Springs. While they're trying to figure out how to start a family and have a baby, they decide to shake things up by in...
Wakefield Poole was born in 1936. He was a very good singer in his childhood but when he reached puberty and his voice cracked, he got into dancing, ballet and theatre. As you would imagine, life soon took him to New York where he became a very famous broadway performer. During one of his visits in 70s to Fire Island he realized his eye for film making and together with his then boyfriend Peter, he made a gay erotic film, Boys in the Sand. He subsequently made a lot of "erotica" films. He still refuses to call them porn. Some of them succeeded and others didn't. He was surprisingly open about his lifestyle and sexuality. He also became internationally famous and his movies screened for years as examples of films that could be artistic as well as sexually explicit. He stopped making films after the AIDS situation.
I am guessing a lot of people like me may not be familiar with the name Wakefield Poole. But this documentary does provide a good insight who he was and why his films were so important, especially in the gay community. He did something that no one else was doing back in 70s for gay men in terms of erotica films. It was interesting to see Poole getting emotional about a lot of memories from all his days like how he got into dancing, when he came to New York, when he made hs first film and all that. Poole gets a lot of screen time to just talk about his life and work directly to the camera. It’s a simple approach, sometimes long, but obviously a very passionate artist and a person who is just a joy to spend time with.
Documentaries are not meant for entertainment but I have to agree that I did learn something about a film maker, a guy who pioneered the whole advent of erotica for gays and subsequently led the way to porn. (5/10)
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